"What makes a Good Teacher?":
Positive - Thinks positively and enthusiastically about people and what they are capable of becoming. Sees the good in any situation and can move forward to make the most of difficult situations when confronted with obstacles. Encourages others to also be positive.
Dependable - Honest and authentic in working with others. Consistently lives up to commitments to students and others. Works with them in an open, honest, and forthright manner.
Organized - Makes efficient use of time and moves in a planned and systematic direction. Knows where he or she is heading and is able to help students in their own organization and planning. Can think in terms of how organization can be beneficial to those served.
Committed - Demonstrates commitment to students and the profession and is self-confident, poised and personally in control of situations. Has a healthy self-image. Encourages students to look at themselves in a positive manner, careful to honor the self-respect of the students, while encouraging them to develop a positive self-concept.
Motivational - Enthusiastic with standards and expectations for students and self. Understands the intrinsic motivations of individuals, and knows what it is that motivates students. Takes action in constructive ways.
Compassionate - Caring, empathetic and able to respond to people at a feeling level. Open with personal thoughts and feelings, encouraging others to do likewise. Knows and understands the feelings of students.
Flexible - Willing to alter plans and directions in a manner which assists people in moving toward their goals. Seeks to reason out situations with students and staff in a manner that allows all people to move forward in a positive direction.
Knowledgeable - Is in a constant quest for knowledge. Keeps up in his or her specialty areas, and has the insight to integrate new knowledge. Takes knowledge and translates it to students in a way which is comprehensible to them, yet retains its originality.
Creative - Versatile, innovative, and open to new ideas. Strives to incorporate techniques and activities that enable students to have unique and meaningful new growth experiences.
Patient - Is deliberate in coming to conclusions. Strives to look at all aspects of the situation and remains highly fair and objective under most difficult circumstances. Believes that problems can be resolved if enough input and attention is given by people who are affected.
http://www.totalesl.com/PreparingYourTeachingResume.php
Wednesday, May 19, 2010
"Critical Thinking" Is Often Just a Dumb Slogan -by Bruce Deitrick Price
The goal of education has always been to achieve critical thinking.
Needless to say, this involves a two-step process: first, students learn a great deal about a topic, whether in history, science or art; then they learn to arrange the information in new ways, to set one fact against another, to find new insights among this knowledge.
Not anymore. Today's educators are in a hurry; they don't bother with the first step. They jump directly to step two. In this scenario, students who know nothing are expected to talk intelligently about it. What absurdity.
Having just heard about X, can you discuss X? For example, the Ottoman Empire, its rise and fall? If you are like me, you know nothing about this complex subject. We will seem completely goofy if we discuss it. Talk about plunging self-esteem. Try chatting about the Ottoman Empire when you know nothing about it.
Far from empowering our students, this upside-down approach just makes them feel foolish and inadequate.
Today's educators have many dogmas, perhaps the chief of which is that students need not memorize (that is, know) anything. Everyone must have an empty head. But that's not bad enough. Then the educators want to add charade on top of ignorance. Students are suppose to engage in deep and meaningful thinking about all the things they don't know.
My impression is that our educators disdain basics and academics equally. All facts are a nuisance; any knowledge is undesirable. But this approach, even in ed circles, might seem somewhat difficult to defend. So they airbrush on a whole layer of lies and distractions. They commence the cover-up...Look, parents, at all the critical thinking! The creative thinking! Your children are so much more advanced now, so much more liberated. Without all that silly knowledge stuff, today's students can soar! They can see new things, things that no one saw before, because their vision is not obscured by facts.
Sure, I'm being a little satiric. I know you want to ask, What's the point? Because you and I know that our educators are immune to satire. These are people who tell ignorant students that a class will now engage in critical thinking, and then they stand the there and pretend that it is happening. Shazam!
It's probably futile but I want to sketch (if only for parents and children) what should be standard operating procedure. Starting in the first grade, students learn the basics in each subject. This foundation is added to in the second grade, the third-grade, the fourth grade, and the fifth grade. As children enter middle school, more reflection is appropriate. Meanwhile, more facts are learned. At this point we can honestly say that children are engaged in some degree of critical thinking.
The goal, as they move closer to college, is to engage in more and more critical thinking. Students will know what they're doing. If they are genuinely engaged in critical thinking, they will be proud of themselves, they will want to do more. But if the so-called critical thinking is a game whereby schools place camouflage over the ignorance of the student body, the students will know this and they will be ashamed.
Needless to say, this involves a two-step process: first, students learn a great deal about a topic, whether in history, science or art; then they learn to arrange the information in new ways, to set one fact against another, to find new insights among this knowledge.
Not anymore. Today's educators are in a hurry; they don't bother with the first step. They jump directly to step two. In this scenario, students who know nothing are expected to talk intelligently about it. What absurdity.
Having just heard about X, can you discuss X? For example, the Ottoman Empire, its rise and fall? If you are like me, you know nothing about this complex subject. We will seem completely goofy if we discuss it. Talk about plunging self-esteem. Try chatting about the Ottoman Empire when you know nothing about it.
Far from empowering our students, this upside-down approach just makes them feel foolish and inadequate.
Today's educators have many dogmas, perhaps the chief of which is that students need not memorize (that is, know) anything. Everyone must have an empty head. But that's not bad enough. Then the educators want to add charade on top of ignorance. Students are suppose to engage in deep and meaningful thinking about all the things they don't know.
My impression is that our educators disdain basics and academics equally. All facts are a nuisance; any knowledge is undesirable. But this approach, even in ed circles, might seem somewhat difficult to defend. So they airbrush on a whole layer of lies and distractions. They commence the cover-up...Look, parents, at all the critical thinking! The creative thinking! Your children are so much more advanced now, so much more liberated. Without all that silly knowledge stuff, today's students can soar! They can see new things, things that no one saw before, because their vision is not obscured by facts.
Sure, I'm being a little satiric. I know you want to ask, What's the point? Because you and I know that our educators are immune to satire. These are people who tell ignorant students that a class will now engage in critical thinking, and then they stand the there and pretend that it is happening. Shazam!
It's probably futile but I want to sketch (if only for parents and children) what should be standard operating procedure. Starting in the first grade, students learn the basics in each subject. This foundation is added to in the second grade, the third-grade, the fourth grade, and the fifth grade. As children enter middle school, more reflection is appropriate. Meanwhile, more facts are learned. At this point we can honestly say that children are engaged in some degree of critical thinking.
The goal, as they move closer to college, is to engage in more and more critical thinking. Students will know what they're doing. If they are genuinely engaged in critical thinking, they will be proud of themselves, they will want to do more. But if the so-called critical thinking is a game whereby schools place camouflage over the ignorance of the student body, the students will know this and they will be ashamed.
by Bruce Deitrick Price
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